duffdaddy

iTrader: (1)

Kinda stole this quote from the caraudio forums but he explaines it better than me.

2-Way vs. 3-Way

In a perfect world, we'd have a single speaker that could reproduce all frequencies perfectly, 20hz to 20khz. Unfortunately for us, such speaker does not exist…..so, we need to break the frequency spectrum down and play it through multiple speakers (mids, tweeters, subs, etc). This is where we get "2-ways, 3-ways, 5-ways, etc" from.

In co-axials, a 2-way speaker is a speaker that contains only a midwoofer and a tweeter…..the midwoofer playing the lower frequencies (down to around 80hz or so), the tweeter playing the higher frequencies (around 3khz or 4khz and up). 3-way co-axials typically have a midwoofer, tweeter and "supertweeter", with the supertweeter being designated to handle the very, very high frequencies only. Co-axials can go as high as 5-way (midwoofer, midrange, smaller midrange, tweeter and supertweeter). For all intents and purposes, anything more than 2-way in co-axials is a marketing gimmick. Going with 3-way co-axials or higher usually does not increase performance much, if at all.

For component speakers, a 3-way system includes a dedicated midbass (generally plays around 60hz-350hz), a dedicated midrange (generally plays around 350hz-6500hz or so), and a tweeter (generally 6500hz and up). Whereas a 2-way system is only a midwoofer (playing around 60hz-4000hz or so) and a tweeter (4000hz and up). Ideally, for a 3-way system, you'd want to put the midbass in your door, and have kicks built for the midrange & tweeter. For a 2-way component set, kickpanels or door mounting will suffice with generally good results.

General advantages of a 3-way component set:

1) There isn't a crossover point in the middle of the midrange frequencies (which are generally the most important to imaging and tonality), and they aren't being split up between drivers like they sometimes are in a 2-way setup. In a 3-way, they will be played by mainly one speaker, which is the dedicated midrange.

2) In a lot of cars, the mids will need to be flipped out of phase to help correct some midrange frequency phasing problems. In a 2-way system where one speaker plays midrange & midbass, running one of them out of phase will decrease the midbass impact. By running a 3-way, the midrange can be flipped out of phase and it has no effect on the midbass since it is being played by a separate driver.

3) The midrange and midbass frequencies in a 3-way may sound "cleaner" since each speaker has more of a limited bandwidth to play.

Disadvantages of a 3-way component set:

1) Tuning and aiming the speakers can be a much bigger pain the *** with 3-ways. Installation, tuning, phasing and aiming speakers will be much easier/quicker to perfect with 2-ways.

2) Room. It can be much more difficult find the room to fit all of the speakers. In some cars, kickpanels are simply out of the question.

3) Money. 3-ways are normally considerably more expensive than 2-ways.

As you can see, 3-ways aren't necessarily better than 2-way. It's more of a personal preference. Some ppl would rather have a 3-way (for the advantages above), some ppl would rather have a 2-way (easier to tune, less room is occupied, etc).

duffdaddy

iTrader: (1)

I removed the Bose amps. Tapped into the Bose wire harnesses in the trunk. Ran the speaker signals into my sound processor. Then from sound processor out to amps. I'm running the JX 360/2 for my focal's in the doors. and the HD1200/1 to the alpine type X.

ashmostro

iTrader: (3)

Thanks duff. I'm actually intimately familiar with speaker building and the real-world physics of it all. Just recently designed some slick CNC grills for my custom Scan-Speak home theater setup (pics below). I've also built custom car audio setups way back when in both two and three way configuration. My favorite one ran an Alpine PRA-H400 processor and a fiberoptic line from the head unit to the processor for absolutely zero EMF noise. It also did time delay, and was an awesome system.

The questions I am asking have to do with the fact that when you are switching from an OEM three-way setup to a custom two-way, you have to do something to rejoin the midrange band to the midbass band or you'll have a band gap. My question was how you did that (since there are a few ways it can be done).

Pics of the HT speaks without and with grills:

duffdaddy

iTrader: (1)

Thanks for being persistent. I think I understand now what your asking. If you look at the Bose wiring diagram that is stickied, there is only one signal from the head unit for front left and one for front right. Which I assumed is a full range signal. Then the original Bose amp spit up that signal into two outputs per side. One for the 10" in the door and one for the 3" + 1" tweeters. I put the full range from the head unit into the sound processor. Then to amps. from amps back into the harnesses.

These are what I ran into my sound processorfor components.

Harness B41 (Pin Number/Item/Color Code)

(33) Front Right + (R)(Red) **Preamp from HU
(34) Front Right - (G)(Green) **Preamp from HU
(35) Front Left + (P)(Pink) **Preamp from HU
(36) Front Left - (L)(Blue) **Preamp from HU

Tapped back into the harness instead of running new wires.

Harness B42 (Pin Number/Item/Color Code)

(1) Front Left Mid/Tweeter + (L)(Blue) **single from amp to front left 1"**
(2) Front Left Mid/Tweeter - (W)(White) **single from amp to front left 1"**
(3) Front Right Mid/Tweeter - (LG)(Light Green) **single from amp to front right 1"**
(4) Front Right Mid/Tweeter + (V)(Violet) **single from amp to front right 1"**
(5) Front Right Woofer + (G)(Green) **single from amp to front right 6.5"**
(6) Front Right Woofer - (R)(Red) **single from amp to front right 6.5"**
(9) Front Left Woofer - (W)(White) **single from amp to front left 6.5"**
(14) Front Left Woofer + (B)(Black) **single from amp to front left 6.5"**
(10) Power/Key (Y)(Yellow) **power to 3Sixty.3**
(11) Power/Constant (GR)(Grey) ** Didn't use this wire**
(12) Ground (B)(Black) **Ground for 3Sixty.3**

Did this answer what your asking?

ashmostro

iTrader: (3)

That's exactly what I was looking for! Thank you too for not getting fed up with me. And how nice that the head unit doesn't do any bandwidth pre-pro on the outputs!

How do you like the 3Sixty.3? I just looked it up and it appears to have time delay. If you're not already taking advantage of it, I highly recommend you try it out. What it can do for the imaging is nothing short of breathtaking!

If I decide to keep my G, I think I will do something similar, although I may stay with a three-way setup. Would probably use Scan-Speak drivers again. In fact, I have some beautiful 12M mids lying around that I've been wanting to use in a car setup for a long time now.

You should also think about sound deadening your front doors with a combination of mat and spray used as a seal. The doors can make great IB enclosures for a strong midbass to the point where a sub can really be used for the infrasonic frequencies alone.


Sheesh, now I remember why I got out of car audio. It can get way out of hand quickly, lol.

quakerroatmeal

iTrader: (3)

Title states SQ setup. Hope you plan on getting rid of that Sony & Jensen amp for something better?

ashmostro

iTrader: (3)

Any discrete amp is going to perform better than the stock OEM crap.

And speakers are at least one order of magnitude more important to sq than amplifiers are anyway.

duffdaddy

iTrader: (1)

Yea I was more or less stating I had some additional equipment to work with if necessary. Those are sitting on the floor in the basement currently.

duffdaddy

iTrader: (1)

The 3Sixty.3 is amazing. I feel like it has brought out the true potential of my speakers. Just wish I had the ability to bring out the true potential of the 3Sixty.3. I may have to call a local shop to tune it. At the very least, it would give me a nice baseline to play with if I wanted to make adjustments. I actually am planning on getting a large box of Dynamat. Waiting till Xmas is done with before spending any more money. With the bass up the trunk is rattling bad, sounds tacky. Plus the doors could use a few pieces. Yea car audio can get pretty complex when going for SQ.

ashmostro

iTrader: (3)

So are you using the time delay function on the 3sixty?

And are you still running the stock center channel, and rear speakers?

duffdaddy

iTrader: (1)

Not gonna start with delay until I'm a bit happier with the overall sound of the system. not using any of the Bose stuff. Just the sub and component set in the doors. Those speakers would just muddy up the sound.

ashmostro

iTrader: (3)

I highly recommend you set up the correct delays first before any other tuning as it can affect phasing considerably. Get your baseline right, then tune.

That's how I've done it in the past and it worked really well. Your call.

RA081224

Im pretty sure the signals from the head unit to the Bose amp are line level or pretty close to it. Im using a 3sixty.2 right now and am feeding those signals into the speaker level inputs and so far so good.

RA081224

One thing to consider is that the amps in the G37 turn on with the ignition switch and not specifically the head unit. This allows you to use the Nav and voice control without turning on the audio system. Adding an amp and a processor will likely make for some nasty turn on bump since everything powers up at the same time. I ordered a PAC TR7 module

Pac-Audio.com Product Details | iPod Integration for your car and More by Pac-Audio - Connecting you to the future

It has three independent channels that can be programmed with different delays. I set up one channel to turn on the processor after an eight second delay and the second channel to turn on the amp five seconds after the processor. This gives me a smooth turn on with no pumps, pops or other strange noises. The only bummer is youll have to wire in a relay to convert the second channel from active ground to active high. Another reason to use this is I found, at least in my case, the stock head unit can only turn on one (maybe two) device at the same time. When I hooked up the processor, everything worked as expected; but the moment I tied the amp turn on lead to the processor and head unit, the draw was too much and the signal was essentially grounded. This killed the entire audio section. with the TR7, Ive got two amps of current to play with which is more than enough for my three amps and processor.